


User Permissions

by SirLadySketch



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Be careful what you tag, Communication, Data!Riku controls the phone network now too, M/M, User permissions, accidental oversharing, fun with technology, gummiphone antics, in which Data!Riku helps, personal journal entries, privacy settings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-22
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2020-07-28 03:00:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,787
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20056927
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SirLadySketch/pseuds/SirLadySketch
Summary: Sora doesn't computer good, and somehow he's even worse with phones. He managed to accidentally send all of his personal (and super embarrassing) journal entries to Riku, including that one about his Neverland dream. Now he's pretty sure his life is over and Riku will never want to talk to him again, but a voice of reason from an unlikely source talks him through it and helps him figure out what'sreallyworrying him.





	User Permissions

**Author's Note:**

> My entry for the "Cross the Line" soriku zine! I had SUCH a blast participating in it, everyone is so incredibly talented. <3 Definitely be sure to check out the other works in this collection-- there's something for everyone!

There were limited places he could go for privacy, so in an act of desperation, Sora sealed himself in the gummiship. He hid in the cockpit, the airlocks hissing closed as he desperately fumbled in his pockets. When he found his phone he thumbed it on, then hesitated. He wasn’t really sure how to go about this, so he took a deep breath and whispered into the microphone.

"Look, I know we haven't actually ever spoken before, but Donald, Goofy, and the King told me about you and we _ really _ need to talk, so, uh, give me a sign that you're listening?"

The screen went black for a moment, then Riku appeared. Well, not _ his _ Riku, not really; it was the Riku of his past adventures, encoded into data form. It was odd to see his best friend looking so young again, especially since he’d just come from seeing the real Riku just moments before. If he had more time he'd have asked about it. After all, wasn’t this Riku supposed to reflect _ his _ Riku-- or rather, the Riku in his world, and not in his memories?

But time was critical and his reputation was at stake. No time for idle curiosities; he needed to know if he should take off in the gummiship to hide from everyone and _ especially Riku _for the rest of his natural life.

This Riku greeted him with a cheerful smile. "Hello, Sora."

"What did you _ do _?" Sora hissed, still afraid that someone was going to overhear them. Not that it really mattered; his life was already over, probably.

"It would help to know what, specifically, you're referring to," replied Riku, but the smugness in his tone implied that he already knew.

"Why does Riku know about... _ you know _," Sora asked. He peeked over the dashboard and through the window. He couldn’t see anyone, but that didn’t mean that they wouldn’t come looking for him. He turned back to the phone and asked, “Why does Riku know about my Neverland dream? Why did he ask if I was serious about going?”

“Oh!” Riku replied, then shrugged. “Because it’s in the journal.”

“Yes, but _ why? _” Sora asked, his voice going higher as stress closed his throat. “I wrote that in my private journal, not the adventure logs! No one was ever supposed to see it.”

“Sora…” Riku trailed off, then the screen changed to the journal entry in question.

> _ I dreamt I was back in Neverland last night. There were pirates everywhere, and I tried flying away and couldn’t. I thought they were gonna get me and it’d be over, but then Riku showed up and I knew everything was gonna be ok. We fought off the bad guys and then we flew around the world together, hand in hand. _
> 
> _ The dream felt different than all the times I'd been there before. More real, which doesn't make sense, but maybe it's because of the Mark of Mastery Exam? Master Yen Sid said there might be side effects. I wonder if Riku has vivid dreams, too? _
> 
> _ Anyway, the dream was... nice. After the pirates we just kinda flew around and we ended up by the big clock tower where I, um... I kissed Riku. _
> 
> _ I don't... I'm not... It just felt right? He was smiling and laughing and it felt like we’d done it lots of times and it was no big deal, but still nice. He just smiled at me and we kept holding hands and flying around. It felt like old times, back home, just the two of us hanging out. I woke up feeling really happy. _
> 
> _ It wasn’t until Donald yelled at me for daydreaming that I realized I’d been thinking about it all day. Everything seemed so natural in the dream, but I didn’t know what to think when I woke up. I know that I love Riku, he’s my best friend and always will be. But… do I love him like _ ** _that_ ** _ ? Or is it just that I’ve been seeing friends like Herc and Meg together, or Rapunzel and Flynn? Do I want to kiss him in real life? Would he even want to kiss me? I don’t know, and it’s driving me crazy. _
> 
> _ I don’t wanna ask Donald or Goofy, they’d never stop teasing me, and I dunno how I feel about it anyway. This is the first chance I’ve actually had to sit down and think it through, and I’m still confused. Is it weird to dream about kissing your best friend and like it? _
> 
> _ Anyway, now I can't stop thinking about it, and I've gotta because I have no idea how I'm gonna face him the next time I see him. I was just gonna laugh it off as a stupid dream and focus on all of the stuff we need to do, but at the same time.... If I asked Riku to join me in Neverland, would he say yes? _

“Yeah, I remember writing it!” Sora said, voice cracking in panic. He could feel the blush burning across his cheeks, although Riku didn’t seem to notice. “But I don’t remember saying ‘Oh hey, it would be awesome if Riku knew about this confusing dream that would raise awkward questions.’ I definitely did not say to send it to him!”

“But you did,” Riku insisted, and the screen scrolled down to the bottom of the journal entry. Sora saw the automatically generated tags, but there was nothing out of the ordinary.

“There’s nothing in the tags that says ‘please share all of my embarrassing dreams with my best friend’!” Sora said, and Riku chuckled.

“Sora, it’s tagged as ‘Riku,’” Riku said as though that explained everything. Before Sora could reply, the phone’s screen flickered, and suddenly they were in his phone settings for User Permissions. There, bold as brass, was a large check mark next to Riku’s name and the phrase “Share all content with user.”

Riku’s voice came over the phone as Sora stared at that mark, trying to let the implications of what he was seeing sink in. “According to the settings _ you _ put in place, anything tagged as ‘Riku’ would be shared with him. That includes all Adventure Logs, Skill Checks, Recipes, and Personal Notes.”

“How many personal note entries?” Sora asked, heart sinking.

“Almost all of them,” Riku admitted, although this time there was some sympathy in his voice. He reappeared on the screen and gave Sora a smile and a shrug. “It’s really not as bad as you think.”

“I _ knew _ I should’ve had Pence or someone look over stuff before I used it,” Sora cried, then slumped against the seat with a sigh. “How is this _ not _ as bad as I think? I said a lot of stupid and embarrassing stuff in these notes and Riku is just gonna tell me how much of a sap I am. I’m surprised he didn’t start teasing me as soon as we arrived.”

Riku pursed his lips, then the screen flickered back to the list of personal notes. The Neverland dream entry popped up again, and Riku’s voice cut in over the visual.

“If you ever bothered to read more than your high scores and statistics tracking….” Riku chastised, and Sora noted the flashing “NEW MESSAGE” under the post’s tags.

“Wait, you mean…?” Sora trailed off as he clicked on and read the note.

> _ I was always afraid of going back there-- I did terrible things, and I wasn’t at my best. On my own, I’m more of a codfish than Hook, but with you by my side, I know I could fly, too. I’d like to try. _

Sora backed out of the note and scrolled down to open another entry with the ‘NEW MESSAGE” symbol. This entry was an offhand comment he’d said while stealing a quiet moment of sitting in the cockpit and staring out at the stars. He didn’t remember mentioning Riku in that entry, but sure enough, there was an entry below his.

> _ Yeah, I can see a cactus! It reminds me of when we were kids. Do you remember the star cluster you swore was a ‘rock’ constellation? I saw something like it tonight that made me smile and think of you. _
> 
> _ It’s sad, knowing the stars I see here are the lights of worlds that’ve fallen into darkness. There are so many, I think you could spend a lifetime trying to count them all. But it’d be a lonely life. _
> 
> _ I’d give anything to be back on the beach with you. _

It went on and on; each and every note had a new response, waiting to be read. They’d been piling up for weeks and he’d had no idea, and he wasn’t really sure what to make of that.

“Riku responded to all of my notes,” Sora said, seeing pages and pages of unread messages. He wasn’t sure why they hadn’t shown up in his normal inbox. He’d have to ask Chip and Dale to explain later, once he’d had a chance to sort things out.

“But… why?” he asked at last, small frown on his face. “I mean, embarrassing dreams aside, most of these are just stupid notes about what we made for dinner and how many times I got to pet a cat.”

“Why don’t you ask him yourself?” Riku asked. “He’s probably wondering where you are. Unless you want me to call him in here?”

“Not necessary!” Sora said, then paused. “He didn’t…. say anything about what I wrote, did he?”

“He said a lot,” Riku said. He reappeared on the screen, grinning. “A lot of which you might be surprised to read. His latest notes have been quite interesting. But it would be better if you talked to him yourself.”

“What do I even _ say _ to him?” Sora murmured, more to himself than anything, but Riku spoke up anyway, ever the helpful assistant.

“You could start by telling him how you feel.”

Sora frowned. Riku used the same tone as _ his _ Riku when he’d thrown the paopu fruit to Sora, way back before their adventures had all begun. Riku, confident and cocky, teasing him when Sora had-- as usual-- failed to beat him. Back then, Sora had been frustrated by Riku telling him what to do. He didn’t appreciate _ this _ Riku making assumptions for him, either.

“What do you mean, how I feel? We’re best friends, simple as that,” Sora said. Riku raised an eyebrow, then the screen lit up with one of his more recent entries.

> _ Riku’s so strong and brave. His keyblade broke but he still kept heart and made it out of the Realm of Darkness without a scratch. He might’ve gotten an unexpected haircut, but all it did was make him look even cooler. Who am I kidding? He’s always been perfect, and he makes it look so easy. I wish I could be more like him. _

Sora scowled down at the phone.

“In my defense, I said that after Donald and Goofy told me I wasn’t cool enough to be like Yozora. I wasn’t at my best, and Riku…” he trailed off, then sighed, slumping against the chair again. “I know he’s not _ really _ perfect, but Riku is Riku. He’s _ always _ been better at everything than me.”

Riku didn’t reply, but the screen scrolled down on its own and opened a new response message without Sora clicking on anything.

> _ I tripped over a rock today and almost fell into the Abyss. Mickey had to freeze time to stop my fall and dragged me back up over the edge. I do stupid, embarrassing stuff all the time. _
> 
> _ I’m not perfect. I don’t know how you can say that, not after everything I put you through. There’s so much I’ve done that I wish I could take back, so much I would change if I was given another chance. _
> 
> _ You’re too hard on yourself. I wish you could see how special you are. _

“I’m not special,” Sora muttered, and he could _ feel _ the eyeroll as the screen switched back to Riku’s face.

“Riku thinks you’re special,” Riku said.

“I’m not--”

“You’re special to _ Riku _,” Riku insisted, and his face softened. “Why are you running from your feelings?”

“I’m not running!” Sora said a little too quickly. “I’m _ not, _” he insisted when Riku gave him that flat look.

“Sora, Riku asked when you wanted to go to Neverland and you _ literally _ ran to the gummiship to hide.” Riku was laughing at him, and while it was a very good point, Sora wasn’t about to admit it. “What exactly are you afraid of?”

“I’m not--” Sora started, then paused. Why _ had _ he run if he hadn’t been afraid? “I don’t know,” he admitted at last. “But most people don’t write down dreams about kissing their best friend and then send it to them. I don’t want to upset Riku and make him avoid me because he’s uncomfortable about some stupid journal entries I sent by accident.”

“So you’re embarrassed,” Riku said, considering. “But you’re not upset that you kissed him?”

“N-no…” Sora admitted after a moment’s hesitation, then continued, “but that doesn’t mean I was gonna mention it!”

“Are you afraid to tell him how you feel?”

“He knows how I feel,” Sora countered. “He read all of my journal entries, didn’t he?”

“Are you angry?”

Sora leaned back and stared at the ceiling, thinking it through. He wasn’t angry that Riku had read everything. They were best friends, and they’d always shared everything growing up. Maybe some details had been a little more intimate than usual, but that didn’t make them any less true. The notes had bared his heart and revealed feelings he hadn’t been able to define. But he didn’t feel scared knowing that Riku had seen them, because he knew that Riku would never do anything to hurt him.

And Riku hadn’t seemed upset when they met up again. If anything, he’d been happy and had gone out of his way to meet their ship as it touched down. Sora originally thought it was the whole happy reunion feeling going around, now that Aqua, Ven, Kairi, and Axel were joining them. But now that he knew that Riku had read his private journal, Riku’s reactions --or lack, thereof-- changed everything.

He wasn’t angry, because it wasn’t Riku’s fault that there’d been a communication mix- up. He wasn’t angry that Riku had responded, because it meant that Riku had cared enough about what he’d written to write back. Riku had cared about him, because Riku thought he was special. He felt _ relief _. Riku wasn’t mad. He’d been happy to see Sora, almost as happy as Sora had been to see him. So maybe it was a good thing, the final nudge that got them talking a little more openly about everything.

And then, all at once, he felt stupid.

“...I didn’t actually change the phone settings, did I?” Sora asked. Riku had been quiet while Sora worked out his feelings, the phone’s screen going dark while he’d waited. But when Riku’s face reappeared, he was grinning from ear to ear.

“I’m an autonomous program whose primary function is to make my user’s life easier,” he said, sounding smug and self-righteous and so _ Riku _ that Sora wanted to chuck the phone across the room. “I run the entire gummi phone network from my base of operations in Disney Castle, and it’s my job to ensure communication channels are running at optimal performance.”

“There were significant gaps in your communications with Riku,” Riku explained. “Things left unsaid in group messages and texts, but spoken aloud and lamented over later. Seeing this, I optimized the settings on both phones to boost performance. As such, there have been significant and positive results.”

Sora wasn’t really sure what to say to that. He should be angry at his _ phone _ of all things, but he wasn’t. He wasn’t happy, either-- he still had to face the real Riku. His phone was right about one thing: he and Riku needed to learn how to communicate better.

“Well… thanks, I guess. I’ll… go talk to him,” he said, then shut off the phone and slipped it into his pocket.

“I’m always here if you need me,” came the disembodied voice from the darkened phone, and Sora glared at it.

“You’re _ always _ listening?”

“Pretty much. How else am I supposed to keep things in order?”

Sora didn’t have anything to say to that, but he was _ definitely _ going to talk to Chip and Dale about the phone settings and creating some dang _ boundaries_.

But first, he needed to talk to Riku-- _ his _ Riku. After all, they had travel plans to discuss, and a lot to catch up on.


End file.
